Titanium Barrels = Bad?

[HyperSnyper]

Hello all,

There is not alot of talk about titanium, most of it has been on titanium bolt and sears which I can see has really gotten alot of flack (sp?).

I am aware now that titanium has poor frictional properties and wears down rather quickly. That is in a condition where titanium is in constant metal to metal contact.

I was wondering about the situation with barrels. There is no real metal to metal contact. Only metal to gelatin (except in the constion where paint is dropped on the ground, then there is alkaline earth metal to metal contact). Would everyone consider these barrels to wear down quickly?

I also know that these barrels tend to spark. This is suppose to be a property or all ferrous metals right? This is only suppose to occur from paint off the ground right (how else could it spark unless there was a harder material on the paint?). When sparks do fly out the barrel, what are the sparks, is it from the titanium or the dirt sparking? Everytime it sparks, does it mean the barrel is getting scratched? Is titanium alloy used in barrels harder than dirts found on the ground (like I use those anyway).

Can anyone inform me of the diferent hardness ratings of the following metals:

6AL4V Titanium
303 Stainless
6061 Aluminum (Annodized)

Does anyone here think if one can be aquired or even traded for real cheap, are these barrels worth it? Or are they trouble?

Much Thx in advance.

-Hyper

[Ultimator]

Who would use paint off the ground anyway? Other than that, there is no real reason the barrel would spark.

[HoppysMag]

not bustin your chops but Flak is spelt well like FLAK. but ya i really dont see a need for a titanium barrel...

[Butterfingers]

Titatnium is a very structurally strong metal but has poor metal to metal wear resitance. It is not a ferrous metal.

Stainless is very strong had good wear resistance but is heavy. It is a ferrous metal. Ferrous means able to be made magnetic. Hardness depends on the treatment.

Aluminum is structuraly weaker but is ligher than the two. The annodizing is harder than steel but you if you wear it off you will expose the underlying aluminum which is soft as cow ish.

I wouldent worry about titanium barrels wearing out. Titanium is harder than aluminum and brass two common barrel making metals.

[steveg]

Tiny correction Butter, its ferrous because it is an alloy
of iron (latin ferrum):)

[HyperSnyper]

Thx for the responses guys, but, does anyone know what is sparking when sparks fly out the barrels. Is it the dirt from the paintball, or tiny titanium bits that are being scraped from the bore wall?

LMK.

-Hyper

[FutureMagOwner]

i doubt that its the titanium thats coming out because dirt as you know is alot weaker than titanium unless the dirt has acidic properties that affect titanium

[slateman]

In reference to actual barrels, it is my humble opinion that a titanium barrel would be bad. Titanium is very strong but light. Normally that's not a bad thing, but in a barrel, it is. When you fire a lot of shots in a burst, the recoil sends the barrel up. I normally compensated for this by aiming low, but this affected my snapshooting. It became really annoning and disappointing. The titanium boomsticks were really accurate.:(

[Will Wood]

Check out the historic posts...theres a topic with all this big terms and forumulas there.


Basically here a sum
SS-Heavy, stong, can mix with other metals
Alum-Light, weak, ditto
titan-Light, strong, corrodes with other metal. That is why the titanum barrels usually have a SS back, so you won't be screwing and unscrewing Titanium to another metal.

[Minimag4me]

quick questions(i hope)

Does that mean you can mix ss and aluminum. Would that be a good barrel material. Is it annidisable(real word?). What about other metal mixtures?